Since last week Wednesday, I have since found a Pomona Electronics box (thanks to Jenne)

to use for my photosensor head circuit (to house the LED and 2 photodiodes). Suresh has

shown me how to use the 9-pin Dsub connector punch, and I have punched a hole in this box

to attach the Dsub connector. 

Since this past entry regarding my mechanical design for the photosensor head (Photosensor Head Lessons),

I have modified the design to use a Teflon sheet instead of a copper PCB and I have moved the LED

and photodiodes closer together, upon the suggestions of Jamie and Koji.  The distance between

components is now 0.112" instead of the initial 0.28".  Last night, I cut the PCB board for the LED

and photodiodes and I drilled holes onto the PCB board and Teflon sheet so that the two may be

mounted to the metal plate face of the Pomona box.  I still need to cut the viewer hole for and

drill screws into the face plate.

I have also been attempting to debug my photosensor circuit (box and LED/photodiode combination).

Since this last entry (Painful Votlage Regulator and Circuit Lessons), Suresh has helped me to get the parts

that I need from the Downs Electronics lab (15 wire ribbon cable, two 9 pin D-sub connectors M,

one 15 pin D-sub connector M, one 16 pin IDC connector). Upon the suggestion of Jamie, I have

also made additional safety changes to the circuit by fixing some of the soldering connections

so that all connections are done with wires (I had a few immediate lines connected with solder).

I believe the the photosensor circuit box is finally ready for testing. I may just need some help

attaching the IDC connector to the ribbon cable. After this, I would like to resume SAFELY

testing my circuit.

I have also been exploring SimMechanics. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to run the

inverted pendulum model by Sekiguchi Takanori. Everytime I attempt to run it, it says

there is an error and it shuts down Matlab. In the meanwhile, I have been watching

SimMechanics demos and trying to understand how to build a model. I'm thinking that

maybe once I figure out how SimMechanics works, I can use the image of his model

(I can see the model but it will not run) to construct a similar one that will hopefully work.

I have also been attempting to figure out the circuitry for the pre-assembled

accelerometer (made with the LIS3106AL chip).  I have been trying to use a multi-meter

to figure out what the components are (beyond the accelerometer chip, which I have

printed out the datasheet for), but have been unsuccessful at that. I have figured out

that the small 5 pin chip says LAMR and is a voltage regulator. I am hoping that if I can

find the data sheet for this voltage regulator, I can figure out the circuitry. Unfortunately,

I cannot find any datasheets for a LAMR voltage regulator. There is one by LAMAR, but

the ones I have seen are all much larger. Does anyone know what the miniature voltage

regulator below is called and if "LAMR" is short for "LAMAR"?